Page 3 - Criminal Practice News Today

In 2006, the General Assembly amended G.S. § 20-197(a) to take the determination of aggravating factors out of the hands of the trial judge and place that determination in the hands of the jury. Thereafter, in State v. Geisslererain, 233 N.C. App. 186, 756 S.E.2d 92 (2014), we held that the trial court committed reversible

While executing an arrest warrant for a gang member, police ordered everyone out of the house at which they had seen the gang member, and defendant was among those who exited the house. During a weapons frisk of defendant, an officer saw what appeared to be packages of heroin in defendant’s jacket pocket. During a

Once the trial court ruled that defendant had failed to make out a prima facie challenge under Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79 (1986), the Batson inquiry should have concluded. Accordingly, we do not consider the state’s post facto reply to the trial court’s request for race-neutral explanations for the state’s peremptory challenges of Black

The trial court did not clearly err in determining that the state did not improperly use its peremptory strikes against Black jurors. The white jurors who gave similar answers and who were not struck were more pro-death penalty and appeared less likely to improperly sympathize with the defendant and/or to give more credibility to the

Where the jury found that defendant acted with all three types of malice set out in G.S. § 14-17(b) (actual malice, “condition of mind” malice, and “depraved-heart” malice), the finding of depraved-heart malice was not necessary to convict defendant of second-degree murder. Consequently, the trial court properly sentenced defendant at the higher B2 felony level

Where defendant caused a head-on collision by driving on the wrong side of an interstate highway, such reckless driving asserted by an experienced state trooper was reasonable grounds for belief that defendant was driving while impaired. The trial court did not err in concluding the investigating trooper’s application established probable cause for a search warrant

During defendant’s police interview, there was a brief moment when one detective aggressively called defendant a liar, and there were questions about his wife’s knowledge of defendant’s infidelity while she was ill. These actions appeared to be the exception to the custodial interview as a whole, and the totality of the circumstances instead point to

For the same conduct, defendant was convicted of (1) assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill inflicting serious injury, a felony; (2) assault inflicting serious injury in the presence of a minor, a misdemeanor; and (3) habitual misdemeanor assault. Under State v. Fields, 374 N.C. 629, 843 S.E.2d 186 (2020), the trial court

N.C. Probation Officer Kierra Mobley testified about defendant’s multiple willful probation violations, as alleged in her report: (1) testing positive three times for controlled substances, (2) twice failing to report to his probation officer, (3) being charged with criminal trespass and (4) being discharged from the Treatment Accountability for Safer Communities program for failing to

Even though defendant was indicted in 2019, evidence of her pseudoephedrine purchases going back to 2012 was relevant to show a consistent pattern of behavior by defendant, indicating she was engaged in the manufacturing and trafficking of methamphetamine. National Precursor Log Exchange records – which reveal defendant’s pattern of purchasing, or attempting to purchase, large ...